Two Paths Diverged
by KissTheBoy7
Summary: Ten years ago, reportedly unstable Frederick Trumper abruptly disappeared from Merano following a fight with his second and supposed lover, Florence Vassy. No one knows why he walked out on the game that could have turned the tables for him. But now he's been found- all the way in Alphabet City, Roger Davis begins to feel Freddie's presence again. Kings and Marker slash pairings.
1. Prologue

**A/N: Well would you look at that. Inky has managed to talk me into posting this even though I know I won't update it for centuries after… Although, I'll probably be bugged about it by my multitude of Chessloving RENTheads. Yay for crossovers.**

Disclaimer: How dare you insinuate that either of these beautiful musicals were spawned from my fucked up excuse for a right brain! Pshh. Yeah, no.

**Prologue**

_It's all over._

He grabbed the first thing he could get his hands on, eyes cast at the wall rather than the object- he didn't check to see what it was, just whipped it on impulse and listened with vindictive satisfaction as it shattered against the blank expanse.

Good. Something fragile. Something he could break.

_Someone_ had to pay for this.

Freddie didn't think he'd ever in his life had such an awful day. That included the entirety of his miserable, lonely, abusive childhood, the dozens of anger management classes he'd stormed out of over the years, and the only occasion that Florence had managed to persuade him to go see a therapist about his, quote-on-quote, "emotional troubles".

What was all of that in comparison to losing the only thing he'd ever dreamed of accomplishing in the space of twenty four hours?

Florence Vassy, the woman he was supposed to marry.

The chess championship.

His reputation.

His _title_.

That was what mattered, wasn't it? He couldn't recover from five consecutive losses. There was no possible way- not in this state, not buzzing with that manic energy that he'd kept at bay for so many years now.

_**I have a name you bastard-**_

He cringed, clapping his hands over his ears as though that would keep the voices at bay. The voice, rather, because there'd only ever been the one and what a one it was. A sarcastic jackass of a voice that never seemed to go away, alarmingly like his own, but not him at all.

God damn it, but he'd lost his mind too.

He had his girlfriend, his title, his sanity- What else was Sergievsky going to take from him?

The American didn't want to think about the other things that he had lost, the financial security, the possibility that the spark in the Russians dark eyes as they met his had really been what he had suspected-

No. Now was not the time to be thinking about expressionless, goody two-shoes, ever-so-polite _communists_. He was angry enough as it was.

Florence. Think of Florence. But that wasn't much better… Who would have thought that the woman who had stayed faithfully by his side for seven years would run off with a Soviet the minute he left her alone?

Seven fucking years of playing pretend, like they could really make it work, like they actually believed that one day he'd be able to commit to anything so _female_ as her, like his father wasn't so perfectly fucking accurate.

They just went on pretending- and look where it got him.

The walls around him seemed too tall, looming over his head and bearing down like a prison cell, their ornate wallpaper taunting him. Another random piece of hotel furniture would have joined the- what was it? Probably a lamp, yup, it was the lamp on the nightstand- lamp that he had already murdered against that fancy gold-leaf and cream patterns, but somehow Freddie managed to keep his head. He ran his shaking hands through his short hair, grimacing at the sweat that coated his fingers.

Ugh. He paced to the other end of the room, then back, legs restless. If he didn't want to be reduced to a raving psychopath pacing in tight circles and ranting to himself about the politics twisting his arms behind him and leaving him helpless during the game, he needed to get out of this _stuffy_ room.

Freddie was just about sick of proving the press right.

"Unprovoked Yankee aggression my _ass_," he seethed under his breath.

Whirling around, he stormed back out of the bedroom without another thought, door left wide open behind him. It's not as though he had anything left worth stealing.

_How dare she._

He couldn't stop the phrase from spinning through his mind, over and over, ricocheting off of the inside of his skull and working him into a fit. _How dare she!_

_How dare she leave me!_

Freddie had always forseen a day that he would tire of his second, leave _her_ side- only in the darkest recesses of his mind did he allow himself to fear that the opposite might prove to be true. _Florence Vassy, petite Hungarian-born personal assistant-_

_**Gentle companion? Right. Fuck that man, you need to hit the clubs, go get drunk-**_

_Get out. Get out of my head._

_**It's MY head, actually, you flamboyant little closet case.**_

_Shut up._

_**How about… no?**_

Freddie swallowed thickly, imagining the smirk creeping onto his own lips in that infuriating voice-

_**What, is that all you've got, chessboy? Bring it. Show me what you're made of, I can take you. I'm ten times the star you're ever going to be-**_

_Shut UP!_

Staying upright was suddenly a challenge, and Freddie wanted to just slump against the nearest wall and sink to the ground and bury his face in his knees. Shuddering violently, he just barely resisted the urge to slap himself across the face as he walked, no paced- fuck he was still pacing and he wasn't even cooped up in his room alone anymore and fuck, but this was bad bad bad bad-

A shoulder knocked into his and he spun, snarling, his head swirling dizzily with colors and words that weren't his or maybe they were-

_Well what did I say? He's out of his tree-_

"Trumper? I was just-"

He couldn't even spare a disdainful glance, couldn't even find the space in his head to be aroused by the fair-skinned, surprised face of Anatoly Sergievsky before he was pushing blindly past him and stumbling down the hall. His coordination was shot. He wasn't going to last much longer-

_He's finally flipped and between you and me-_

_**Damn right you're not, Freddie-bear.**_

"Hey- Wait! Where are you going? Come back-"

He couldn't shake the feeling that the disturbed look on Anatoly's face meant that he looked about as crazy as he felt, but he had to keep going because if he stopped then- then-

He didn't know what then.

_He's no hope of retaining his crown in this frame of mind-_

No, he obviously didn't, and here he was proving them right again.

Fuck. Damn Florence. Damn Anatoly. Damn his mother, his father, damn Walter and Molokov, damn the press, damn the voices in his head-

_In fact he shouldn't have come here, he should have resigned._

Sneakers slapping the pavement as he finally made his way down the stairs and right out of the building, right into the darkening streets into the warm glow of the sunset and the streetlights that were just beginning to come on. The traffic, the voices in the background, they all melted into white noise as the voice got louder, taunting him.

_**What, no smartass retorts? Come on. I know you've got better than that, Fred.**_

_Get out, get out of my head…_

_**But Freddie! I've always been here! Aren't we friends?**_

Every condescending word was enough to make him want to pull his hair out. On the verge of a panic attack, he found himself swearing under his breath as he knocked into people, cursed loudly at to watch where he was going.

_Please… Please just get out. I need to be alone…_

_**I can help with that.**_

He blinked and suddenly he realized that he had ducked into an alley without even realizing it, leaning against a wall as his labored breathing echoed in the still air all around him, the buzzing in his ears rising to ear-shattering levels as his panic attack overtook him. His hands were held out before him and he stared at them helplessly as they trembled, swallowing down the sudden paralyzing fear.

_No- please, make it stop…_

Whimpering, he clutched his head in his hands and sank to the ground, eyes squeezed shut tightly as the blackness began closing in around him.

_**Sure thing.**_

Choking back bile he looked on in amazement as the shaking ceased, the world coming back into focus- he tried to move his hands, sit up straight, but he couldn't. He was paralyzed, looking out through the eyes of another person-

Oh. Fuck.

_WHAT DID YOU DO-?_

_**Only what you asked me to do, Freddie. Come on. You trust me. You know me. I'm your buddy. Roommates, remember? Up here.**_

Seemingly of it's own volition, one of his hands came up to tap an index finger lightly on his skull, his mouth pulling into the smirk he'd been imagining earlier-

_It's all over._

Damn the cocky bastard of a voice in his head.

Damn him. Damn Freddie.

Damn…

_**Roger.**_


	2. Chapter One

**A/N: I've been sufficiently busy these past few weeks with school and homework and just getting back into the swing of things, but you'll be happy to know that I finally posted this just for Inky. Actually I don't know if anyone else is even reading it. Ah well. It's done!**

Disclaimer: _Neither Roger nor Freddie are mine, but I wouldn't object if any of you wanted to gift them to me? Perhaps for Christmas?_

**Chapter One**

It's a little known fact that Roger can play chess at all, let alone that he's good at it.

Well, great might not be the right word. Perhaps 'stellar' is a better way of putting it. Mark hasn't beaten him once in the last eight years and he's played him probably a thousand times. He's pretty sure that he's the only one, too, so maybe he's just not very good at it and Roger doesn't have to try too hard. But the plastic gold trophy he'd won in his senior year on chess club said otherwise.

Eight years of living with a person tends to make one lax. Indeed, Mark found himself early on developing a routine as much as he hated them, or said he did, and as many times as he said to himself that he was going to break all of his old habits and start fresh, a new bohemian life full of art and spontaneity and freedom. Maybe it was human nature or maybe he was just a habit-forming person, or maybe it was Roger and his unpredictable mood, unpredictable lifestyle that made Mark gravitate towards the same old boring thing again and again. It didn't really matter _how_, though, as long as he knew what to do.

A day in the life of Mark Cohen looked a little something like this:

**6:00**- Restrain self from throwing that damn alarm clock at the wall and get up to take a shower. Wake Roger at your own risk.

**6:30**- Make a pot of coffee and fill a travel mug. Lay Roger's medicine out on the counter with a sticky note indicating where he's gone and reminding him to take his AZT.

**6:45**- Check to make sure he has everything and that Roger is breathing. Lock the door behind him.

**7:00 to Noon**- Return home to find Roger sprawled on the couch, with his guitar or possibly a beer and a wrinkled legal pad covered in aimless scribbles. Proceed to force him to eat something for lunch, regardless of how little they have and that he'll probably sneak it into the trash when Mark's not looking.

**1:00 to 3:00**- View the new footage and ignore Roger's snarky comments and/or pestering until he can't take it anymore and gives in like he always does.

**3:30**- Say something embarrassing in conversation that gets that shit-eating grin on Roger's face. His day is then officially made, not that he says it out loud.

**4:00 to Midnight**- Listen to Roger rant and rave about his career, his future fame (never mind that he only has a few years to live, never mind that he hasn't written a song since before Mark even knew him) and the woman that he's going to sweep off her feet (even though he's always looking at Mark as he says it, flushing faintly) and play with his hands, his hair, watching him strum on his guitar until one or both of them passes out with a smile on their faces.

And so it had been since he'd arrived in the city at twenty, a fresh failure from Scarsdale ready to make it big in the city slums with a duffel bag and a dream. Granted, there have always been other people to factor into the equation, coming and going from their lives- April and her fiery hair, Mimi and her candle, various groupies, Collins and a box of cereal, Angel and her drums, that awful two years that he dated Maureen until she finally stated the obvious and left him- and there were the drugs, too, that ate up a chunk of that time, but Mark likes to think that he's at least made himself a life here. Even if he hasn't really made a film, hasn't really done anything but wait a few tables and take a lot of useless shots of homeless people and their cardboard beds, he's happy here.

Happy with Roger.

Eight years are more than enough to get to know someone, and Mark is thoroughly convinced that he could spend the rest of his life with Roger, tension unspoken between them, living for drunken slip-ups on summer nights and cuddling on the couch in December, even if Roger would kill him if he heard him call it that. He knows Roger so well, inside and out, the good and the bad, that he'd endure pretty much anything just to be near him for as long as he exists.

Sometimes, though, Roger still catches him off guard. Like those times that, out of nowhere, he'll burst out with outdated politics and ridiculously offensive slurs against this or that person that Mark has never heard of. Like today, awake before even Mark, staring at him in the dark and begging as soon as his eyes have opened for a game of chess before he leaves.

And because Mark can never say no to Roger (heaven forbid!) he agrees. At least it's quick.

And honestly, are the homeless people on Avenue C really going to care if he's a few minutes later than usual in passing?

The board is already set up, and Roger situates himself behind the white pieces like a hen settling into her nest, completely at home. Mark notices that he's actually wearing a shirt, must have gotten up and gotten dressed before the alarm even went off, and he's too busy being impressed to wonder why it's one of his and not Roger's.

_He must have been anticipating this all night_, he muses to himself as he stiffly sits at the other side of the board and waits with a small, amused smile for the white-clad Roger to make his opening move.

He does so with an almost unnatural focus, concentrating so hard that his tongue doesn't even poke out like it did the last time he tried to open a pickle jar- "I can _do _it!" "Roger, just let me-" "I SAID I CAN DO IT."- and finally moves a knight out into the open. Mark sits back and prepares for yet another embarrassingly quick loss.

The memory of his first match with Roger is one of the most amusing he's accumulated since his introduction to bohemia, and that's saying something. Everyone talks about Roger's arrogance- what they don't know is that Mark had his fair share, too, before the city had ground him down, and at twenty he'd worn a smirk so similar to Roger's it was uncanny. It had been a night of drunken idiocy and after a messy wrestling match in which they spilled the rest of the beer and didn't bother to wipe it up, just tossed Mark's pants- when did they even come off?- over the liquid to soak it up, Roger had made a suggestion.

He'd been so sure he could win. That plastic gold trophy in his mind seemed to wink out of existence when, in a five move blur, Roger had plucked his king off of the board and crowed, "I am the _champion."_

In the years that followed he'd tried to no avail to kick his friend's ass at the game he'd thought himself somewhat good at, but not once had he won a match. Occasionally Roger would gloat, dangle the king in front of his face while he swatted him away in good-natured resignation, but most of the time he just smirked and got that look in his eye like he knew something that Mark didn't. Then it would be gone, just all of a sudden, but the expression lingered in Mark's mind and appeared in his dreams over and over and over.

Because honestly, what he did know about Roger he knew from experience. He knew that he bleached his hair often enough that the stink of it lingered in the bathroom more days than not, and that he's a possessive lover, and that he has an awful jealousy problem. He knows that he snores but only if he's been drinking; he knows which side of the bed he likes to sleep on. What Mark doesn't know, what he _wants_ to know, is if things had always been this way.

Had Roger always been this sexy, cat-like bohemian with the chipped black polish on his nails and the morning breath that could debatably paralyze a fully grown elephant?

As he makes his half-hearted moves, the cogs in his brain finally beginning to turn, he wonders when Roger was even born, what his middle name was. Where were his parents? Who was his first kiss? There were so many things and in eight years he hadn't once thought to suck it up and just _ask._ Maybe if he had, maybe a long time ago before they'd gotten so content, dug their rut together, it would have made sense but now it would just be awkward.

And Mark might be the king of awkward, but he really, really tried not to be.

_Really._

So many things he didn't know, probably never would, and it was a wonder that he could still be happy with so many unanswered questions hanging heavily between them. But he could and he was and Roger set his piece down decisively, muttering, "Checkmate."

He blinked, shoving his glasses up his nose and looking up to meet those blue-green eyes. He blinked again. Where was the look? Obviously something was different- he just wished he knew what. Agitation had replaced the usual satisfaction, and Roger swings his head to the side, shaking it with a slow scowl as he begins putting the pieces away, locking them up in the foldable wooden board where they'd be safe. He reached out for his hand, intending to offer some measure of comfort, but Roger batted it away and his mouth tightened in such a way that he flinched away warily.

Sometimes, when Roger isn't busy confusing the hell out of him, he reverts back to Withdrawal Roger and everything gets tense.

But this doesn't seem the same. The jerky movements he's witnessing now are something else entirely, and he's not sure he's seen them before. Maybe once- maybe way back when, when he'd first come to the city. When he'd sometimes heard the mutterings through the walls, listened to Roger pace and pace and pace until he dropped into bed, exhausted and obviously irritated with someone- no one had any idea who it could be. One of them, perhaps? But then why hadn't he said anything? _This_ isn't at all what he'd expected.

"Roger?" he asked meekly, unsure of how to proceed. He's afraid of setting him off, to be honest- Roger can be dangerous as hell when he wants to be, and he sure looks it now. But Roger doesn't seem to hear him, or maybe he's ignoring him again. He finishes putting the pieces away, straightens up and beelines to the kitchen.

"Coffee?" he asks gruffly, and Mark gives a startled nod of assent.

Well. That's the end of that conversation.

**CHESSRENTCHESSRENTCHESSRENT**

The rest of the week is the same as ever and Mark begins to wonder if he'd imagined it all, as per usual. These incidents come and go and fade from his mind just as quickly because let's face it, this is Roger and he's never going to change. Friday finds them navigating the concrete jungle on their way back to the loft from CBGBs after yet another shitty gig with the new band that Roger's not so fond of. He's in a relatively good mood though, all things considered, and Mark smiles behind the lens, watching their sneakers as they scrape the sidewalk.

"August seventeenth, nineteen ninety," he murmurs in amusement as the guitarist streams endless complaints about Jared and the band, the shitty amp he has yet to replace (and probably never will), this and that and the other thing. "Roger can't find his tampons-"

The guitarist narrows his eyes, mouth snapping shut abruptly, and growls rather like an angry cat. Mark is well aware that he's smaller, weaker and very likely to get the shit kicked out of him if he antagonizes his roommate but he still thinks this is hilarious, sniggering even as he shuts the camera off obediently. "Is somebody grumpy?"

"You're dead when we get home," Roger threatens, crossing his arms in a near pout. Mark just grins. This is one of those times, the kind he only ever has with Roger, that he doesn't have to worry about what he says or how he acts. Whether or not people are watching him, he's well within his comfort zone.

Of course, he's not about to go grabbing his hand and skipping merrily down the sidewalk on his arm.

But he doesn't need to. He tucks the camera safely under his arm, sticking close and watching people pass, their reflections in the glass of the shop windows. They pass one in particular, an electronics store with an enormous television set on display and something catches his eye. He stops abruptly, throwing an arm out to keep Roger from leaving him behind, and stares at the familiar face on the screen.

"Roger- that's _you."_

**CHESSRENTCHESSRENTCHESSRENT**

"No the fuck it's not."

The words are out of his mouth before he even sees what Mark is pointing at, because he knows what it is- in the back of his mind, there's an uncomfortable stirring and he struggles not to panic. He's been getting stronger, he can sense it, ten years of dormancy building his rage.

_Let me out!_

No.

He shakes his head, scowling irritably. There- that shouldn't look too out of place. He was irritable enough on a regular basis, right? Reluctantly he swivels to look in the window that Mark is so fixated on, chest tightening anxiously. He can't hear the words through the thick pane but the headline below his headshot serves just fine.

"The Frederick Trumper Story"

Of course. His expression remains carefully blank but internally he's raging, spitting and cursing at himself for forgetting. Of course, he'd completely forgotten. It wasn't as though it was important. He was _Roger_, he wasn't Freddie, he was never going to be Freddie again but the damn press had to go and stick their nose into his business.

_At least that hasn't changed. Let me deal with them?_

Nice try, he thinks darkly, sneering at the weaker persona. Freddie stirs again, and he can practically feel him glare. Sometimes it's hard to align the two of them, so different and so the same. He wonders if maybe they're not two personalities but two people in the same body, two souls accidentally entwined.

Mark would have thought that was damn poetic. He just thinks it's annoying.

"Yes it is. Look." Said filmmaker is still enthralled, keen eyes scanning over the features on the screen. There he is, young and arrogant, smirking at the screen. There's no way that Mark could mistake that look- it's the same one he wears now, used to wear at every one of his gigs and every night they'd dance around each other, teasing and playful and building up to something neither of them had any experience with. "That's _you._ That's your earring!"

Damn it.

_That's what you get for stealing my life, you bastard._

It's _my _life!

He shakes the voice from his head, belatedly giving Mark a supremely exasperated look. "I think I would know if I'd 'disappeared' ten years ago, Mark. Come on. Let's just go already."

Mark stops him before he can walk away again, insistent. Roger wants to slap him. "What do you mean ten years? Where does it say that?" Oblivious, he searches in confusion for the words that aren't even there. _Fuck._ He can't afford slip ups like that, not even once. It's been too long, he's put in so much goddamn effort-

_I WANT OUT._

Oh, shut it! Jesus. You're so fucking pushy.

"For God's sakes- go home Mark." He yanks his arm away, glowering. Mark stumbles a step backwards looking hurt but it's too late and the songwriter has already whirled, leather jacket crinkling as he shoves his hands in his pockets and stalks away. He ignores his roommate's frantic voice behind him.

"Roger! Roger wait! I was just asking-"

But no, he can't face him now. Freddie squirms in excitement- this is the closest he's come in a decade to revealing his past, _his_ and not Roger's because Roger is a different fucking person thank you very much. And damn if Roger is going to let him unravel the tapestry he's woven. Mark is _too important_ and if he finds out he might never want to see Roger again, or worse, he might start calling him _Freddie._

_What's wrong with my name? You're a real asshole, you know that?_

Shut the fuck up or I'll _burn_ you.

It sounds like an empty threat but the line of small, circular marks lining his arm beneath the jacket says otherwise. The voice lapses abruptly into silence. His chapped lips twist into an almost bitter smirk, the same he had worn on that television. It had given him a chill to see himself again on the screen like he used to, every day, biding his time until he could stage a takeover. He'd _never _wanted to see that face again, too young and intelligent, a prodigy.

_My title-_

"Stick your title up your ass."

He doesn't realize he's said it out loud until the woman crossing his path stops, her gaze swinging towards him. Freddie has disappeared and already the idea, the concept of him is blurring. Who's Freddie? He doesn't know a Freddie. He notes vaguely that he's wandered into the park, a nicer part of the city by far, but his observations stop there, mostly because the woman's face has broken into a wide smile. Her chocolate eyes meet his almost in disbelief, and Freddie's presence comes surging back, choking him with overwhelming nostalgia.

"Freddie?"

_Florence._


End file.
